Tiger Zinda Hai is not political at all, claims Ali Abbas Zafar

Filmmaker Ali Abbas Zafar who launched the trailer of Salman Khan and Katrina Kaif starrer much awaited ‘Tiger Zinda Hai’ yesterday in Mumbai, says the film doesn’t focus much on the romance between the two leads. He clarified that ‘Tiger Zinda Hai’ is not a love story between Salman and Katrina but two people on a mission to stand for peace.

“Ek Tha Tiger was essentially a romantic story, where you saw Salman and Katrina’s characters as lovers. But in Tiger Zinda Hai, you will see them as agents. The scale and action sequences are more real and gritty. The film talks about many important issues that are affecting us. The romance is not the focus,” Ali said.

‘Tiger Zinda Hai’ revolves around a mission to rescue 25 Indian nurses who are kidnapped by the world’s most deadly terrorist organisation headed by Abu Usman in Iraq. This film is inspired by the real-life incident of 46 Indian nurses being kidnapped by the ISIS in Iraq in 2014. Although Ali admits that the 2014 rescuing mission was his citation point, he has developed a fictional story around the event.

“In 2014, this event happened. I had this idea at that time, and I wanted to do a fictional film based on the incident,” Ali said. “We wanted to make a film that looks very credible, but also one that tells a very human story at the same time. The film is not political at all; it only talks about what is right and what is wrong.”

The ‘Sultan’ director also revealed that his new film wasn’t earlier supposed to be a sequel to ‘Ek Tha Tiger’ (2012). “My story had two intelligence agents. Since there was already a movie where Salman and Katrina played agents, we decided to merge those characters with the new story.”

When asked about the sense of nervousness and pressure on him keeping people’s expectations in mind, he said: “Yes, a lot (smiles). In fact, I have been nervous throughout the film. First, I am dealing with a very popular film; and plus, Salman and Katrina are very big stars, so we are already dealing with a baggage of expectations. Also, I did Sultan with Salman, which became a big hit. So people’s expectations from me have increased even more.”

Presented by Yash Raj Films, ‘Tiger Zinda Hai’ is set to release on 22nd December.

Rahul Raut is a freelance Entertainment correspondent and writes Bollywood contents here on Asian Style Magazine. Completely passionate about cinema, he can be spotted chatting about films at cafes and on social media. Get in touch with him at rahul@asianstylemagazine.com.